Mojo - The Music Magazine

The big screen at the back of the stage flickers into life with news footage shot in Tampa, Florida, in 1973 celebrating the fact that Led Zeppelin have broken The Beatles’s US box office record. It is not coincidental. Rather, it is a poignant reminder of what we are about to witness, making no small point about the scale upon which Zeppelin operated on.

That said, make no mistake, tonight is an all-or-nothing deal - one where Zeppelin’s reputation as the greatest rock’n’roll band of their generation will be cemented or tarnished forever in one two-hour performance.

Such is the air of near-hysteria generated by the band’s return that the pre-gig chatter involves everyone from Germaine Greer to illusionist Paul McKenna holding forth on their hitherto unheralded love of Zeppelin in the press. For the average ticket holder – beneficiaries of the on-line lottery system that saw a reputed 20 million register in the slim notion that they may get in to the show, itself a tribute to Atlantic founding-father Ahmet Ertegun – the overriding question is simple: what the devil with they start with?

As Jimmy Page lays down two trenchant barre chords, the answer is confirmed by Jason Bonham and bassist John Paul Jones’s percussive interplay: Good Times, Bad Times.

Battling suspect sound and the odd blast of feedback, Robert Plant’s vocals emerge from the mix quite possibly an octave lower than the original recorded version but with no less authority. Ramble On follows with an equal sense of nervous urgency, and shared smiles between Plant and Page.

The tense version of Black Dog that emerges next boasts some particularly audacious bass work from Jones and another tellingly re-interpreted vocal from Plant, as well as the final confirmation that Jason Bonham – a mere 14 years old when his father John passed away in September, 1980 – is an impressively heavy drummer in his own right.

In fact, key to tonight’s set is the manner in which Jimmy Page, Robert Plant and John Paul Jones refer to Jason throughout the set. Initially, you mistake it as attempts to urge him on. Then, as the show progresses you realise that Bonham Jr, like his father before him, is immensely capable of keeping Zeppelin’s engine room pumping, allowing Page and Jones the backdrop against which to jam and walk that live high-wire with untempered impunity.

“Well, thank you for the thousands and thousands of emotions we’ve been going through for the last six weeks,” comments Robert Plant after a highly charged In My Time Of Dying. “For Ahmet and for Jason…"

"This is our first adventure with this song in public,” he announces as Page strikes up the riff to For Your Life. It’s not a track you’ll find on Mothership, nor that the casual Zep fan would know and yet, blessed with a crystal clear sound and a sense of growing onstage confidence, it reflects the band’s depth of material and sense of adventure.

The hard rock funk of Trampled Underfoot - Zep’s adaptation of Robert Johnson’s Terraplane Blues, according to Plant - is up next with John Paul Jones on keyboards and Page grinding into the riff with relentless joy.

“The next song was immortalised by The Staple Singers and then the Blind Boys Of Alabama,” announces Plant. “We were in church in Alabama in 1932 when we first heard this and when Blind Willie McTell heard his first shot…”

Zep’s take on Nobody’s Fault But Mine emerges from Page and Plant guitar-and-vocal interchange, and includes six-string and harmonica histrionics from that pair, underlining Zeppelin’s heartfelt ability to translate blues effortlessly into the rock idiom without ever selling the source material short. It’s a point borne out by Page on Since I’ve Been Loving You which, following an epic No Quarter, sees the man peeling off an epic guitar solo boasts his trademarked honeyed tone. Tellingly, the track ends messily but, as Page and Plant defer to Bonham once again, it concludes with a broad smile rather than a scowl.

“There are certain songs that have to be there, and this is one of them,” states Plant as Jones and Page pick out the spine-chilling intro to Dazed And Confused. As, midway through, Page whips out his bow and enjoys a moment encased in a laser-beamed triangle, Zeppelin enter a moment where communication reaches a point of near transcendence – Plant’s wordless vocal enhancing Jimmy’s glissando guitar that sees the audience spellbound and builds to an emotionally shattering crescendo. Then the stage goes dark…

What follows are four songs that bring the main set to its climax in relentless and glorious form. Illuminated by a spotlight, Page picks out the unmistakable opener pattern to Stairway To Heaven, Often covered to the point of cliché, tonight proves that in its author’s hands, it remains one of rock’s most wondrous moments. A crunching The Song Remains The Same, a giddy Misty Mountain Hop and a monolithic Kashmir (where Plant reaffirms his golden god status in the most unashamed of fashions) bring the curtain down on the main set with group hugs aplenty.

“What do you think, Dave?” asks Robert Plant, presumably addressing a dumbstruck Dave Grohl, as he and Page, Jones and Bonham return to the stage for the first of two encores. A blues-ified Whole Lotta Love and, following another bow, a dizbusting Rock’n’Roll bring the evening to a fitting climax with grins all-round from all four onstage participants.

It is only as you watch them taking the applause and walking off that, following an enraptured two-hour set, you realise that you could draw up and equally impressive second set (Communication Breakdown, Immigrant Song, When The Levee Breaks, Heartbreaker, The Ocean etc). It’s at that point that you also find yourself wondering whether this really is it as far as Zeppelin are concerned? After tonight's euphoria, it is impossible to believe it will be.

Phil Alexander